The Long Lie

by Jethro25

An old friend returns to NCIS after years away. Can she re-enter her old life? How much have things changed? Kibbs and a little bit of Tiva.

1. Chapter 1

Title: The Long Lie
Author: SAGibbs25
Rating: Mild
Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters.
Spoilers: End of Season 2 & In a very general way Seasons 3-5
Summary: An old friend returns after spending some time away, and tries to re-enter her old life, but finds that some things have changed while others remain the same.

The Long Lie

"Nadia."

The call came from across the street and behind her. Her name was not actually Nadia, but she'd been using the alias for so long now, that sometimes she wondered if it might be. She turned to face the man who'd called out to her.

"Gregor," she sounded as if she were surprised to see him. In truth, she'd been waiting for over an hour so she could walk by, allowing him to see her and make the first move.

He was a handsome man, tall, with dark eyes and hair, good skin, and broad shoulders. In another time and place, she might have been attracted to him. Not now. She knew far too much about Gregor Mikhailovich Uriadin. She was well aware of how many lives he'd ruined, how many he'd ended, many of them with his own hands.

She made herself smile. It was a good show. Anyone watching would believe that she was actually delighted to see him. He approached her, the smile on his face even wider. He stopped in front of her, bending slightly to kiss her once on each cheek.

It wasn't easy for her to conceal the way her flesh crawled whenever he touched her, but she was a pro. It had been nearly three years that she'd been working on this op. Almost a year of prep time, and two years gaining his trust and getting close. She'd had to leave behind everyone and everything that she cared about, slinking off into the night, letting them all think she was gone forever.

She often wondered if they would ever be able to forgive her for the deception. It had been necessary, vital even, and she'd refused at first, but in the end they'd convinced her it was all for the greatest good.

"Is everything all right, Nadia?" Gregor asked. His voice was tinged with genuine concern.

"I'm fine," she answered in perfect Russian. "Just a bit of a headache." She was still amazed at how easily it came to her now. When she'd been recruited for the op, she'd been able to speak a few phrases in Russian. Now she practically thought in the language. The training she'd been provided was very good. Very good indeed.

A cold gust of wind rippled her long coat and she tugged it tighter around her. Gregor fell in beside her, wrapping an arm around her. He steered her toward the lobby of a nearby hotel. It was cold enough in London, in November, without the wind.

"Come Nadia," he said. "Let us get you inside, out of the cold, yes?"

She smiled up at him, and allowed him to move her toward the hotel.

They passed through the revolving doors and into the lobby of the Windmere. He steered her through the lobby and toward the hotel bar. He took the shopping bags she'd carried as part of her cover. One from Herrods, and another from an antique shop called Montgomery's. He glanced into the bags as he set them down next to the table where they sat. A blouse and scarf were in the Herrod's bag, and an old silver pocket watch, carefully wrapped was in the other.

He went to the bar himself, as was his custom, rather than waiting for a server. He returned with two shots of vodka, the good stuff. He set one in front of her and sat across from her with the other.

"This will warm you up, Nadia," he said. "It will help with your headaches as well."

"Thank you," she said, inclining her head just slightly. She downed the vodka in a single gulp, as did Gregor. "I never expected to run into you today," she said.

"I have business here in a few minutes," he said. There'd been a time when he'd never have said a word to her, or anyone else about his business.

"I found the most adorable blouse and scarf at Herrod's," she said.

"I noticed. Perhaps you will wear them when you allow me to buy you dinner this evening." The sly smile on his face told her that without a doubt, he was planning on ordering more than he could find on the menu.

"Of course," she answered, though she knew it was one date she wouldn't have to keep. Thank Heavens for that. Just the thought of it made her stomach start to do flip-flops. He dropped his hand to her knees and began to massage her thigh. She smiled at him and pretended to pout a bit. "How long is this business of yours going to take?"

He grinned and said, "An hour. Perhaps two, at the most. Then I will return and we will go upstairs, yes?"

She let a smile tug at the corners of her mouth. "An hour would be better."

He laughed out loud. "I knew you'd eventually realize how much you wanted me," he said, and she was certain he wasn't joking. He had a very high opinion of himself, which she didn't share.

He went to the bar and got her another drink, then checked his watch. "I must go now. I will return very soon, and then we will spend the rest of the evening together."

He left the bar, and headed toward the elevators.

She downed her drink and reached into her purse, pulling out a compact which she flipped open. It had a small mirror, and a little switch. She flipped the switch, which turned on some tiny lights around the mirror. It also activated the micro-transmitter hidden inside. "He's on his way up," she said quietly, while pretending to check her makeup. "Tracking dot has been set."

She'd slipped a tiny GPS tracking dot into the pocket of his suit jacket when he'd embraced her outside. It too had remained inactive until now. The lights on her mirror flicked on and off twice, a remote signal that her 

message had been received. They'd be activating the tracking dot now, and would be able to follow Gregor straight to whatever room he was using for his meeting.

Three years of work and planning. Three years of living a false life, and today it would all be over. Today more than a dozen major terrorists would be apprehended, along with the man who'd been supplying the majority of surplus Communist Bloc arms to Hamas, Hezbollah, al'Qaeda, and others for almost two decades.

Finally she would be able to go home, to tell her family, her friends that she was alive, and how sorry she was that they'd been allowed to believe otherwise. It had been necessary. That was what she'd been told. As few people as possible could know who she really was. As of that moment, aside from herself, only her CIA contact, three Mossad agents and the Mossad Deputy-Director, a pair of MI5 agents, and the former and current Directors of NCIS were in the know.

She sat in the bar and played her part, the bored mistress, waiting for her man to return. It wasn't easy. The excitement continued to build. It ended today. The Long Lie would finally be over. Caitlyn Todd smiled to herself, took a deep breath, and thought longingly of home.



CHAPTER TWO

"Yeah, Gibbs." The voice on the other end of the line was one that LeRoy Jethro Gibbs loved and hated at the same time. Jenny Sheppard had been many things to him in the last nine years, probie, partner, lover, friend, & boss. Somewhere along the way they'd had a falling out, and though they'd since reconciled, there would always be some trust issues there. "I'll be right up," he said, snapping the cell phone shut.

"McGee, I want a full report on Crutchfield's movements over the past three days when I get back." In his usual way, Gibbs walked quickly to the stairs and took them two at a time on his way up to the Director's office.

"On it, Boss!" McGee called out to his team leader's back, though he shook his head, wondering how the hell Gibbs thought he could manage to do the impossible. Of course, it wasn't like this was the first time Gibbs had asked for a miracle. Actually,…asked? More like demanded. Realizing that this line of thought was wasting precious time, he got back to work.

Jenny Sheppard was well aware of the trust issues between herself and her top agent, formerly her mentor and lover. What she was going to have to tell him now would not help matters. Not at all. Forget that it was her predecessor, Director Morrow who'd set this chain of events in motion, Gibbs would have a hard time accepting that she hadn't filled him in. She considered showing him the written order from SecDef making the operation strictly Need to Know, but she knew it wouldn't change his mind anyway. At least she wouldn't be the only target of Jethro's wrath today.

Donald "Ducky" Mallard sat at the small conference table in the Director's office. He loved Jethro Gibbs like a brother, and he'd very much regretted being forced to lie to him regarding the current situation. More than once, he'd been very tempted to impart the secret knowledge he held to his friend, but his loyalty to the oaths he'd sworn, and another direct order from SecDef had kept him quiet as well.

Ducky feared for his friendship with Gibbs, which had been sorely tested last year, after Gibbs' return from Mexico. They'd managed to get past that problem. They'd get past this one too, or at least that was what Dr. Mallard kept telling himself.

There was a short tone from the phone on the Director's desk, followed by Cynthia's voice on the intercom. "Special Agent Gibbs is here, Director."

Jenny stabbed a button on the intercom with her finger. "Send him in please, Cynthia."

A few seconds later, the door opened. Cynthia appeared, followed by Gibbs. He strode in a few paces and stopped, looking at Ducky.

Jethro Gibbs had always relied on his gut. With all due respect to the great leaps NCIS had taken in scientific analysis, forensics, and computer technology, none of that would ever replace the smarts and especially the instincts of a field agent. At that moment, his gut was telling him that whatever the Director had called him up to her office for was, he wasn't going to like it.

"Ducky," Jethro said, giving a slight nod to his old friend. He couldn't quite keep all the curiosity from his voice.

"Jethro," Ducky replied. Having known him as long as he had, Ducky's tone confirmed Gibbs' suspicions.

"Why don't you have a seat, Agent Gibbs," Jenny said, gesturing to the chair across from Ducky's.

So, this was to be a formal meeting. Gibbs nodded once to her, and took the seat she'd indicated. As he sat, he shot Ducky a questioning look. The older man met his eye, but couldn't hold his gaze. Jethro's gut clenched again.

The Director sat. That was how he was thinking of her now. The Director. Not Jenny.

"Agent Gibbs," she said, in her best no-nonsense Director's voice, "I'm sure you're wondering what's going on here."

"Well, yeah," Gibbs said, intentionally casual in the hopes of perhaps throwing her off her game.

She knew him too well. She smiled a bit and went on, calmly. "What I am about to tell you is Classified information. Top Secret." Gibbs eyes darted to Ducky. "Ducky has been read in from the beginning," the Director said.

Ducky cleared his throat and once again met his friend's gaze, this time holding it.

"Tell me," Gibbs said. He knew it was impossible, but his gut began to tell him where this was going.

"Operation Sword Dancer," the Director said, "was an operation conceived of by the CIA and the Mossad, approved and ordered directly by SecDef, and signed off on, albeit reluctantly by my predecessor, Director Morrow, in one of his final acts as Director of NCIS." That statement alone set alarm bells off in Gibbs mind. A tiny part of him began to hope against any possible hope.

The Director went on. "When it became clear to us, and to Mossad that Ari Haswari was not a mole, but was actually a terrorist, it set off a panic in the Armed Fed pipeline. One of the reasons that I was named Director of NCIS was this operation, and my contacts within the Mossad."

Gibbs was listening to Jenny, but his eyes were locked onto Ducky's. If what he thought was happening really was, then Ducky was the key, and it would explain his presence here, and his involvement in Sword Dancer.

"Deputy-Director David reasoned out Ari's intentions before anyone else. He contacted a CIA source, whose name I can't give you, but for now we'll call him Redstone. He contacted Redstone and they conceived of a plan. It went up the chain of command, all the way to the White House in only a few hours. Director Morrow was ordered to participate, based upon the agreement of the principle agent, which he got. It was what prompted him to accept the Deputy-Director's position at DHS."

Gibbs knew now. It was impossible, but he knew it for truth. What else could it be? He was getting more than a bit angry at the manipulations this all involved, but he kept it all restrained. He wanted all the information he could get, and he knew she'd hold back if he started yelling.

Through all of this, Ducky had sat quietly, in his normal position, elbows on the table in front of him, fingers intertwined, except the forefingers and thumbs, which formed a steeple just below his nose. He could see in Jethro's eyes that the younger man knew what was coming. He lowered his eyes for a moment, a tacit admission of 

guilt for his part in the deception, and a silent apology to his old friend. Jethro never budged an inch, his expression never changed. Only his eyes.

The Director continued. "A Mossad agent, close to Ari, discovered his plan to hurt you by killing Agent Todd."

Gibbs spoke, "And you let her go into that situation anyway."

"Not me, Jethro," Jenny said. "I came late to this party."

"Was it Ziva?" Gibbs asked. He was having a bit harder time now keeping the edge from his voice.

"No." The Director leaned down, next to Ducky, across from Gibbs. She waited until his gaze shifted from Ducky's eyes to her own. "Ziva still doesn't know. She believed in her brother."

Jethro tried to read the lie in her eyes, he looked for the tiny twitch that had always told him she wasn't being truthful, but he couldn't find it. She was telling him the truth, or at least she believed that she was. Either that, or she'd been working very hard on her poker face.

"Keep going," Gibbs said, turning his gaze back to Ducky.

The Director in Jenny wanted to remind Gibbs that she was his boss, but she understood his anger. Had she been in his position, she'd have been just as angry. She continued. "The Mossad agent close to Ari swapped his ammunition for convincing blanks, even going so far as to Moly-coat them just as he had."

"If they were blanks…"

"A deception played out more for Ari than for you even," the Director said. "An FBI sniper, one of the best, on a rooptop close to Ari's, using a gel-filled non-lethal casing, fired from a silenced rifle."

"And he knew Ari would shoot Kate in the head?" The disbelief in Gibbs tone now was obvious.

"A tidbit supplied by Deputy-Director David," Jenny said. "When using a rifle, Ari always shot for the center of the forehead. With a pistol, to kill, he always shot center-mass."

"I was on that rooftop. Kate was dead."

The Director looked to Ducky. "Dr. Mallard?"

"Yes," Ducky said, clearing his throat. "That was our friends at CIA I'm afraid. They've come up with a little pill which stops cardiac function and respiration for about four minutes, and when that time is up, the function returns, but at such a low level as to be all but undetectable, except by sensitive machinery or a very skilled medical practitioner."

"That's why you and Palmer showed up so quickly that night, and rushed her out of there."

"I've often wondered why you never asked me about that. We were only a few blocks away, but we waited five minutes before driving over, slowly."

"So Kate's not dead then?" Gibbs asked.

"Not so far as I know," Ducky said. It was amazing that he'd managed to get this far without getting side-tracked into some long-winded aside. It was a testament to his friendship for Gibbs.

"That was some idiot stunt," Gibbs said, his anger now showing clearly. "That gel-filled shot could still have killed Kate, hitting her in the head like that."

"She knew the risk and agreed to take it Jethro," the Director said.

"And it was unlikely, in any event," Ducky interjected. "It has been removed from her medical file, but when she was seven years old, Kate fell from a tree onto a sidewalk. Her skull was cracked, and doctors installed a small, very thin metal plate. It wouldn't have stopped a real hollow-point bullet, but was more than sufficient against the gel-cartridge."

"Where the hell is my agent now?" Gibbs asked, not bothering to keep the anger from his voice anymore.

"She should be arriving here any minute," Jenny said. "I sent someone to pick her up at Dulles."

"You let all of us, and her family, think she was dead for more than three years?" The question was directed at Jenny, but Gibbs stare was firmly upon Dr. Mallard.

"We had no choice, Jethro," Jenny said.

"The hell you didn't," Gibbs shot back.

"I'm sorry Jethro," Ducky said. "I intended to tell you the night I drove you home, when you resigned, but you never spoke a word, and I feared what it might do in your emotional state."

"What the hell has she been doing for three years?" Before either could answer, he went on. "What the hell is Sword Dancer all about?"

Jenny took a deep breath and answered. "Gregor Mikhailovich Uriadin."

Gibbs interrupted, "Scumbag Russian arms dealer and dope runner."

"Yes," Jenny confirmed. "He is known in international circles as the Vulture. He's been one of the primary arms suppliers to Hamas, Hezbollah, and al'Qaeda, amongst others for the last fifteen years. He is also one of the primary drug suppliers in Western Europe and Israel."

"How does Kate fit into this?" Jethro asked. He was a bit more under control now.

"She bears something of a resemblance to a woman Uriadin knew at University. A woman that Mossad's dossiers said he'd never gotten over."

"How close a resemblance?"



"Very close," the Director said. "A bit of plastic surgery took care of the rest." Gibbs heart sank just a bit. He couldn't imagine anyone changing anything at all about Katie Todd. He'd never admitted it, even to himself, not even after her "death", but Katie had been the most beautiful woman he'd ever known, and she'd become the most important person in his life. Until Ari had taken her away, or so he'd thought.

"What was her in?"

"Mossad snatched the real Nadia Valenkova. They interrogated her thoroughly, and eventually locked her away in case they needed more information from her."

"And Kate took her place."

"Yes. Mossad found an opportunity and inserted her into Uriadin's life." Gibbs gut clenched again. The deliberate way she'd phrased that was like a massive alarm. He knew what had more than likely been required of Kate in order to gain Uriadin's trust. He almost couldn't picture it, couldn't believe it. Ducky was once again refusing to meet his eyes. He knew!

"I hope it was all worth it," Gibbs said. His tone clearly implied that he doubted any such thing was possible.

The Director answered. "Two days ago, in London, Mossad, MI5, & CIA captured Uriadin and his Lieutenant, Victor Ivanovich Demitriev, along with several high level Hamas, Hezbollah & al'Qaeda operatives, and a pair of Chechnyan rebels. The information Agent Todd provided also allowed them to seize a Lebanese freighter off the coast of Morocco with a massive weapons cache bound for Syria, to be smuggled into Iraq."

He didn't want to admit it, but even Gibbs could see what a huge success the operation had been. "What about Kate?" he asked. "Will she get her old life back now?"

"I'm not sure, Jethro," Jenny answered honestly. "She might not want it back." It was a fair point.

"I'm supposed to keep quiet about this, right?"

"Top Secret, Agent Gibbs," the Director said. "Do not let me find out that you've told anything about this operation to your team." Ducky smiled to himself at her choice of terminology.

Just then, Gibbs' phone rang. He glanced at the caller ID. It was McGee.

"Yeah, Gibbs," he answered.

"Uh, Boss," McGee stammered. "You're not gonna believe this."

"Tell Kate I'll be right down," Gibbs said. In the bullpen, McGee stared at his phone, and at the resurrected Caitlyn Todd, who'd just stepped off the elevator, in equal shares of utter disbelief.



CHAPTER THREE

Tony grabbed the handle above the window on his side of the car, holding on for dear life, and praying under his breath that he would live through the day. He was incredibly thankful that he'd decided to skip his morning breakfast burrito today, opting for only a cup of coffee and a snack bar. If he'd had the burrito, it would now be all over the dashboard of the dark blue Dodge.

Of course, he had to take some of the blame. He didn't have to agree when Ziva asked to drive. The keys had been in his pocket. He didn't think she'd have hurt him to get the keys away from him, but with Ziva he was never one hundred percent sure. Especially lately. Something had been bothering her for the last few weeks. She refused to talk about it, and she rarely let it, or anything else, show while they were working a case, but he knew her too well for her to hide it from him completely.

He was pretty certain it wasn't anything to do with him, or even NCIS for that matter. It was something personal. It was still kind of strange to think of Ziva having a personal life. Of course, over the last few months, that was something he'd begun to ponder more and more often, but he was in unfamiliar territory. He cared for her, more than he should, and he was more than aware that she felt something for him, but he was hesitant. When had Tony DiNozzo ever worried about pursuing a beautiful woman? Of course, this beautiful woman was his co-worker, his partner. And, she was a deadly assassin who still left him bewildered as often as not with how she thought. Not to mention the trouble he'd be in with Gibbs for violating Rule number twelve. Maybe he could convince the Boss that since Ziva was Mossad's Liason Officer, and technically not an NCIS employee…no, if he didn't buy it himself, Gibbs certainly wouldn't.

Another possibility was that whatever had Ziva preoccupied these days had to do with Mossad, maybe with the less than perfect relationship she had with her father, Deputy-Director David. Three times in the last week he'd overheard snippets of phone conversations she'd conducted in Hebrew. He didn't speak the language, but she hadn't sounded happy.

On Tuesday he'd tested his theory, during his weekly piano lesson at Ziva's, intentionally misplaying several notes in a piece she'd made him practice repeatedly the week before. She'd barely noticed the second time. The first time she hadn't noticed at all.

She swerved left around a slower moving Ford pickup truck, into the oncoming lane and around before cutting sharply back to avoid the oncoming Mercedes, prompting an angry horn blast from the pickup, and another from the Mercedes. Tony grabbed the handle again and used his other hand to brace against the dash.

"Stupid someday drivers," Ziva said.

"It's Sunday drivers," Tony corrected, and after a quick pause, he added, "and it's Thursday."

Ziva didn't bother to respond. As he settled back into a more natural position in the seat, he looked over at her. She had an exquisite profile, dark hair falling down alongside her face in soft waves, offsetting the light skin so perfectly. Her dark eyes had a haunting, haunted quality to them that he found mesmerizing. Perfect cheekbones and soft lips he'd been dying to kiss for months. Soft wasn't a term many people would use to describe Ziva, but Tony was well aware of just how deliciously soft she could be.

She was looking back at him now, a slight frown on her face. "What are you looking at?" she asked in a clipped tone. Her accent had faded somewhat in the last three years, but it was still there.

"You," he answered simply, without further explanation.

After a second she asked, "What are you up to, DiNozzo?" the suspicion was clear in her voice.

He'd always found her accent sexy, from the very first time she'd shown up at NCIS, catching him in the middle of a fantasy involving Kate and a Catholic schoolgirl uniform. God, Kate. It had been three years and he still felt like he'd been punched in the gut every time he thought of her. He'd loved Kate too, but not in the same way. She'd also been his partner, and she'd been able to get under his skin, perhaps even more easily than Ziva seemed to, and being who he was, he'd been unable to resist an occasional fantasy. Kate was, after all, a beautiful woman as well. He'd always known though, right from the beginning, that there couldn't be anything serious between them. They were like competitive siblings, each of them always vying for the approval of Daddy.

"Are you alright, Tony?"

Ziva's question pulled him back from his reverie.

"Yeah…I'm fine." She looked at him again, suspiciously, but said nothing, instead concentrating on her suicidal driving. She swerved around a Lincoln Navigator and gunned the accelerator to slip between a cab and a TV repair van, before easing back down to around fifty-five. Never mind that the limit on this street was thirty-five.

"You going to tell me what's wrong?" she asked, without looking at him this time.

"I will if you will," he answered smoothly, slipping his new sunglasses out of the case and over his eyes. The case disappeared back into the inside pocket of his suit coat, a charcoal grey Hugo Boss today.

"What are you talking about?"

If he hadn't known her so well, he might have believed, from her tone and expression that she really didn't know to what he was referring. But he did know her. He simply smiled at her, raising a single eyebrow behind the tinted shades.

"Fine," she said, knowing that he wouldn't buy her continued assertion that she was not bothered by something, "but you go first."

"Un-uh," he said, with a slight shake of his head, raising a finger, warning her of the car she was about to slam into the back of. She jerked the wheel again and raced around the Pontiac on its right. "I fell for that last time," Tony said. It bothered him a little that he hadn't even been worried by the close call with the Pontiac, that he was becoming accustomed to riding with her.

"Just tell me what is wrong," she ordered, as though she expected him to comply.

"Nope."

"I will hurt you," Ziva said, resorting to a threat of physical violence, which wasn't unusual, though she rarely followed through, at least not so much so that there was any permanent damage.

"Not until I get your word."

"Fine, you have my word," she said.

"Your word on what?" Tony asked, having no intention of allowing her to slip out of telling him on some linguistic technicality.

"I give you my word that if you tell me what is bothering you right now, I will tell you what has been bothering me." She looked somewhat exasperated at having been forced to this course, but he knew she'd have wriggled away if he let her.

"Okay," he said. If Ziva gave him her word, he'd believe anything she said.

"I'm a little bit concerned for my life with you behind the wheel," Tony said.

"DiNozzo," Ziva started to say, her tone darkening a bit, in warning.

Before she could finish, however, Tony went on, "but what you were asking about was two different things." He paused, and Ziva waited quietly while he gathered himself to continue. "I was thinking about Kate for a minute there."

Ziva nodded to herself. Despite her feelings for Tony, she never felt jealous of his memories of Caitlyn Todd. She knew he'd fantasized about her, but Tony was who he was, and she had to admit, Caitlyn had been a beautiful woman. Ari had certainly found her fascinating. Somehow though, she had always known that Kate & Tony had never gone beyond friendship. In fact, she admired Kate, for who she'd been, for the fierce loyalty she'd engendered amongst her co-workers. She wished she'd had the chance to meet her before she'd died.

"And I was also thinking about us," Tony said.

"You and I?" Ziva asked. He nodded in response. "What about us?" she asked. She'd been waiting for this moment for some time now, and he would have to pick such a time and place for this discussion.

"I just think maybe we should talk about a few things," he said. "But maybe there's a better time and place," he added, through gritted teeth, as she swerved again, gunning the Dodge past a black Audi.

She shouldn't have been surprised. Tony DiNozzo was intelligent and brave, except when it came to his emotions. "Of course", a tiny little voice inside her said, "you didn't have to pass that Audi & scare him again." Deep down, Ziva knew she feared that he'd tell her exactly what she'd been longing to hear. She feared what it might mean, how it might change things between the two of them, and how it might change the overall picture at NCIS. She feared what Gibbs would think. She wanted his respect more than anyone else's on Earth. He'd become the father figure for her that her own father had never truly been.

"Ziva," Tony began again, "lately I've been…"

She cut him off before he could get any further, "Perhaps you are right Tony. This might not be the time." The look of relief on his face was so clear that she nearly laughed out loud. Instead, she kept her amusement to a little smirk. Of course, she didn't intend to let him off the hook altogether. "When you come for your lesson tonight, we can discuss things then, yes?"



"Yeah," Tony said. It was an eight hour reprieve for him. It gave him eight hours to really think through how he was going to handle things. It usually took him eight seconds, if that. He leaned back in his seat and exhaled. He could see the amusement on Ziva's face. "Your turn," he said.

The smirk disappeared from Ziva's lips. Suddenly, he couldn't read her at all. Her face was a total blank. He'd seen this before, and he referred to it as Mossad Ziva. When she wanted to, she could be as cold and hard, and emotionless as a block of stone, or at least she could appear to be. She'd make one hell of a poker player.

"I haven't heard from my sister, Tea in almost two weeks, and I am getting concerned."

"Is she Mossad as well?"

"Yes."

A thought occurred to Tony then, and he asked, "You know, I've always meant to ask, the woman you swapped robes with, at the Embassadero, the night we met, was she your sister?"

Ziva nodded. "That was Tea."

"If she's half as good at her job as you are," Tony said, "I'm sure she's just fine."

Ziva glanced over at him. He gave her a reassuring smile.

"Thank you, Tony," she said, as she turned into the Navy Yard., and approached the gate.

"Seriously, Ziva," he said, giving her shoulder a small pat, "I'm sure she's ok." She nodded again and rolled down her window to show the guard her ID. She hoped that Tony was right. In her gut, she'd begun to get the feeling that something big would happen today. For a moment there she thought it was going to be her talk with Tony. Not now. It was something else. Something big, and it would happen soon.



CHAPTER FOUR

When Abby had awakened that morning, it was with a smile. She'd dreamt of Kate, as she often did, but it had been a happy dream, with none of the usual melancholy that usually came with dreams of departed friend. They'd been sitting at a corner table, at DC Beans, sipping drinks, coffee for Kate and Caf-Pow for Abby. They talked about everything that had happened at NCIS in the three years Kate had been gone, and they'd laughed and cried together. It felt to Abby as if Kate had never been lost.

Abby couldn't wait to talk to her friends at work about the dream, but when she'd arrived, Tony and Ziva had already left the office for a trip to Norfolk to interview a suspect. McGee was hard at work on his computer, trying to track down another suspect, and Gibbs was out getting himself coffee.

When she got to her lab, she had several tasks waiting for her. There was a sample of what she suspected was heroin, seized from a dealer at Little Creek by Agent Grisham's team which she had to run through the GC Mass Spec. It proved her suspicions correct. There was a ballistics match to be made on a weapon which Agent Balboa had recovered from an off-base storage unit, which could prove the guilt of a Supply Officer in a robbery case at Hampton Roads, and there was a ton of information to go through on the Supply Officer's laptop.

It was several hours later when she finally made it down to Autopsy. She figured that Ducky, at least, might have a moment to talk to her. She bumped into Jimmy Palmer on his way out, off to run an errand for Ducky.

"What's up Duck-Man?" she asked brightly as the doors to Autopsy swooshed open to allow her entry.

"Good afternoon, Abigail," he said, in that voice she always found so comforting and re-assuring. He was just in the process of slipping on a sports coat over his shirt and tie.

She bounced across the room, full of energy and wrapped her arms around the Scotsman. "I have to tell you about my dream last night, Ducky," she said.

He hugged her back, but said, "I'm sorry my dear, but I'm afraid you'll have to tell me later. I've just been summoned to the Director's office." He pronounced it Die-wreck-tore, as he always did.

"But Ducky," Abby said as he started for the door, "my dream, it was all about…"

At the same time, Ducky started, "The Director needs me now Abby, something to do with…"

"Kate," Abby finished, stopping Ducky in his tracks.

"What did you say my dear?"

"I said, my dream last night was about Kate. And it was such a good feeling, like she was really there with me."

Ducky looked puzzled for a moment, but realized that Abby wasn't finishing his sentence for him, but rather her own. He'd never been one to believe in so-called pseudo-sciences, like e.s.p., or psychics, but this was not the first time Abby had seemed to sense something before it happened.



"Yes, well I'm very sorry Abigail," he said, hoping to escape without possibly saying something that would arouse her suspicions. "I really must be going. The Director seemed quite impatient."

"Okay, Ducky," she said, though she seemed a bit crestfallen.

He stopped just outside the doors and poked his head back in, after hitting the button for the elevator. "Perhaps when I'm done upstairs I can come to your lab and you can tell me all about it."

Abby smiled, and the room seemed to light up. "Thanks, Ducky," she said. "You're the man."

As the elevator doors closed, Ducky said to himself, "We'll see if you feel the same way in a few hours my dear," and he began his trip up to the Director's office and a confrontation with his old friend.



CHAPTER FIVE

Caitlyn Todd stepped from the jetway into the Northwest/KLM terminal at Dulles International airport. It had been a long flight, and she'd wanted nothing more than to get a little sleep, but it was not to be. She'd spent most of the flight worrying over what she was going to say to her family, and her friends. How could she explain the decision she'd made to let them all think she'd been killed?

Her folks would forgive her, she knew. Her brothers and sisters would eventually forgive her as well. Even Tony, McGee, Abby, & Ducky. They would all forgive her, though it might take time, especially with Tony. However, the real issue would be Gibbs. She had no idea what Gibbs would do. There was no one whose opinion was more important to her, no one she cared more about. She'd resisted her feelings for more than two years, and she'd fought to keep them alive for the last three. What terrified her was what was going to happen in the next six to eight hours.

She walked down the terminal, very grateful that she'd chosen to wear sneakers on the plane, rather than heels. Even so, her feet hurt. She could hardly wait to get home, or for now to the Ambassador Hotel, since that would be home until she could find a new place, her old apartment having been long re-rented. A few hours of sleep would be just what the doctor ordered.

She walked out through the doors near the security checkpoint. Two men waited in dark suits and sunglasses, which they were wearing inside, as if that wasn't like a neon sign naming them as Feds, moving when they saw her. The first man approached her, reaching inside his jacket. She instinctively tensed, her training kicking in without thought. The other man stood patiently, seeming as though he were watching everyone and everything. The first man reached Kate, pulling an ID badge out, flashing her his credentials.

"Miss Todd, I'm Officer Cartwright, from Langley." His voice was deep and resonant, pleasant sounding, and she would have to admit that, imperically speaking, he was a handsome man. None of that put a dent in the surge of irritation she felt at having the CIA waiting for her at the airport.

"Agent Todd," she corrected him tersely.

He ignored her, answering with, "We're here to escort you to Langley for debriefing."

Kate started walking again, forcing him to follow after her. The second spook, who still hadn't been introduced to her, followed as well. She turned left and stepped onto the escalator which would take her down to retrieve her bags. "No," Kate said.

"Excuse me?" Cartwright asked.

"I said no. I'm not going straight to Langley. I've been flying for more than eight hours."

"Ma'am," Cartwright began, only to stop short at the deadly glare from Kate.

"Ah-hem," he started again. "Agent Todd. My orders are to bring you directly to Deputy-Director Milford's office."

"Tell him you tried."



"That's not good enough," he said, belatedly adding, "Agent Todd."

Kate shrugged, not really caring at all about what Officer Cartwright, or his boss wanted. She stepped off the escalator and moved to the large screen, which told her upon which carousel she'd find her bags. She watched a moment until her flight came up. Carousel D. A quick glance around the baggage claim told her where she needed to be, and she set off.

Officer Cartwright grabbed her arm, starting to object again. In a flash, he was on the floor, on his back, looking up at Caitlyn Todd walking away. He couldn't help but notice what a nice view it was. He'd never even seen her move. His partner helped him to his feet, trying hard to keep a smile from his face.

Kate didn't bother to try hiding her smile. It wasn't Cartwright's fault really. It wasn't him she was angry with. But it had certainly felt good putting him down like that. She said a quick, internal thank you to Tea David, who'd been her Mossad Case Officer for Sword Dancer. She'd been the one to teach Kate that maneuver, amongst several others.

The two CIA officers trailed Kate at a reasonable distance. She saw the reflections in the glass doors ahead, and took note, without really thinking about it, of both officers, their positions behind her, the fact that Cartwright was now speaking on his cell, as well as two or three other folks in the baggage area who seemed slightly off in one way or another. A man wearing a grey trench coat and carrying an umbrella despite the sunny skies, another with dark eyes which seemed to follow her every movement., and a petit, pretty Asian woman who, though it wasn't readily visible, was carrying a gun under the dark blue jacket of her business suit all stood out to her. The man with the trench coat was likely just one of those people who always wanted to be prepared for bad weather. The man with the dark eyes was probably just admiring her. Kate was not unaware of how she looked, and the effect she had on most men. The woman was more than likely the one she was looking for, though she sat quietly in one of the seats provided for people waiting on their bags, flipping through a magazine. Neither of the CIA dweebs even seemed to notice her.

Kate stopped in front of the carousel and waited. She was lucky. Her bags were among the first few to come out. She reached out and lifted them, first one, then the other. She turned and started toward the sliding doors which led outside, coincidentally, or probably not, very near where the Asian woman sat.

Cartwright and his partner approached her again. "Agent Todd," Cartwright said, his voice much more serious this time, "I'm afraid you're going to have to come with us. You're still assigned to Temporary Active Duty with CIA." His look said he was enjoying putting her in her place.

"Is that so?" she asked.

"Whether you like it or not," Cartwright answered smugly. His partner seemed to sense that she hadn't been talking to them. He turned slightly, just in time to see the Asian woman step up behind them. She already had her ID out.

"I don't think so," she said. "Special Agent Lee, NCIS," she said, flashing her credentials under Cartwright's nose. "I'm here to bring Special Agent Todd back to NCIS."

"She's TAD'd with us," Cartwright said, raising his voice just slightly, and stepping a bit closer, trying to intimidate the small woman. She didn't back up a step.



She reached into her bag and pulled out a folder. "Not according to these," she said as she handed the folder to Kate. Turning to face her, she said, "Special Agent Todd, by the order of NCIS Director Sheppard, you are no longer on loan to the CIA. You are to report immediately back to NCIS."

Cartwright mumbled something derogatory under his breath, but it was loud enough for Kate to make it out. The look she gave Cartwright was enough, on its own, to cause him to step back. She smiled to herself again as she allowed Special Agent Lee to take one of her bags, then followed her out to the curb outside. Another NCIS agent, whom she didn't recognize, stepped out of a dark Dodge sedan idling at the curb. He took the bags from Kate and Lee, placing them in the trunk. Kate climbed into the back seat while Special Agent Lee and the man got in front.

As the car pulled away from the curb, Agent Lee turned and said, "I have no idea what's going on, Agent Todd, and part of my orders from Director Sheppard was the instruction to inform you that you are not to discuss your assignments with me, or anyone else, until you've met with her directly."

Kate smiled and shrugged. "I kind of expected that," she said. "And, you can call me Kate."

"I'm Michelle. This is Special Agent Darren Lestner." He nodded to her in the rear-view mirror.

They rode for a few minutes in silence until Michelle said, "At some point, if possible, I would like to have coffee with you and ask how it is I was ordered to pick up a dead woman at the airport."

Kate chuckled to herself. She expected that there would be a lot of that in the near future.

Fifteen minutes later, Kate stepped from the car in front of the building that had been such a large part of her life for two years. The moment she both longed for and dreaded was getting very close. What would they say? What would she say? Despite all the time she'd spent thinking about it, she still had no idea.

Agent Lee handed her a visitor's badge, which she clipped onto the lapel of her cream colored jacket, and they walked inside. With the badge, and her escort from Agent Lee, she made it quickly through the security checkpoint. She didn't recognize either of the men working that day.

A flood of memories hit her hard as she stepped onto the elevator. How many times had she ridden that car with her teammates? How many times had she watched Gibbs use it as a de-facto conference room?

She stepped off the elevator and stopped dead, looking around the bullpen. Most everything was exactly as she remembered it. Agent Lee kept walking until she realized that Kate had stopped.

"Is everything all right Agent Todd?"

Kate looked around again. Her eyes locked with McGee's. He was standing behind his desk, mouth somewhat agape.

"Yes," Kate answered Lee, "I'm fine."

She started moving toward the bullpen, turning the corner, past her old desk. McGee was holding his phone in his hand, staring in almost equal amounts of shock at both her and the phone. She stopped directly in front of his desk.

"Hello Tim," she said.

"Kate…," The disbelief, and unspoken questions were clear in his voice. After a very brief pause, he said, "Gibbs said he'll be right down." She nodded and took a deep breath. Show time.

CHAPTER SIX

McGee was flabbergasted. He hung up the phone, but he couldn't tear his eyes away from the woman now standing in front of his desk. How could Kate be alive? He'd visited her corpse in the morgue.

"I appreciate what you said to me, Tim," Kate said, as though she'd been reading his mind. "I've always really liked you too, even if I did help Tony tease you."

"What….how….?" McGee simply couldn't find the words to even begin asking the questions he needed answered.

"I enjoyed your book," Kate said.

"You read Deep Six?"

"Of course. But McGee, you couldn't come up with a name better than Pimmy Jalmer?" She laughed, and McGee realized that she really was here. Even though she'd been standing there for a couple of minutes now, some part of his brain had been holding out, disbelieving. He rushed around his desk, gathering Kate into his arms and into a massive bear hug.

For her part, Kate hugged back, though not quite as fiercely. "I missed you too, Tim," she said, a tear forming at the corner of her eye. She wiped it away quickly when he put her down. If she started down that road now, she'd be crying for hours. Tears of joy or sadness, it wouldn't matter. Both probably.

She caught the movement out of the corner of her eye. Gibbs and a slender redhead were moving along the upper level toward the stairs. He always seemed to stride with determination, but she nearly had to run to keep up with him. Kate patted McGee on the arm and turned toward the stairs.

Gibbs looked a little order, a little more care-worn. His hair was more silver, less dark. Some of those new lines in his face she knew she'd helped to put there. If anything though, they made him even more handsome in her eyes. She'd been dying to see him for three years and now they were almost face to face, and she still had no idea what to say.

His blue eyes met hers as he hit the bottom of the stairs, and held her mesmerized. He marched right up to her as she steeled herself for his anger, but just as he reached her, his eyes flicked over to McGee and he passed her by without a word. "McGee," he snapped, drawing the younger agent's focus to him. "What have you got?"

"Got?" McGee seemed confused by the question for a second. "Oh, right, the Crutchfield case…" he hesitated. "I've been a little distracted Boss."

"Well yeah, McGee," Gibbs said, his eyes slipping quickly to Kate, and then back again. "Go brief Special Agent Balboa on everything we have to this point. His team will be taking over the case."

"Really?" McGee started to ask, before cutting off his question. "On it, Boss," he said instead, adding a small slap to the back of his own head, saving Gibbs the time and energy. He began gathering papers from the file spread across his desk.

"Gibbs," Kate started to say, but stopped immediately when he held out a hand, index finger raised. He moved to his own desk, opened the top right-hand drawer and took his badge and Sig. The badge went into the inside pocket of his sports coat. The Sig holster he clipped to his belt at his right hip.

He looked at McGee again and said, "I'm going for coffee." He ignored the amazed stares from his junior agent, his former agent, and his Director. He continued, "Brief Balboa, find DiNozzo and David, and get the whole team together in the conference room. Fifteen minutes." With that, he simply walked to the elevator and got on. The only time he even looked at Kate again was just before the doors closed. For the briefest instant, his blue eyes once again held her own, and she couldn't swear to it, but she thought the corner of his mouth might have turned up, in what might have been the beginnings of a smile.

McGee was on the phone, cradling the receiver between his ear and shoulder while he plugged a memory stick into the port on the side of his computer and began downloading case files for Balboa's team. "Tony, how long until you and Ziva get back here?" He paused a second, awaiting a response and said, "Get up here a.s.a.p. You're not going to believe what just happened." He hung up before Tony could try and badger anything out of him.

The redhead with Gibbs held out a hand. "Agent Todd," she said, "I'm Jennifer Sheppard, the Director of NCIS."

"Call me Kate."

"I'm Jenny."

"I've heard a lot about you," Kate said.

"Nothing bad, I hope."

Kate smiled, though she didn't answer the question. If the Director noticed, or cared, she didn't seem to show it.

Kate looked again at the elevator, biting her lower lip in a rare display of nerves. Why hadn't Gibbs talked to her? Was he trying to punish her for taking part in the CIA's deception? Her mind was racing.

"Relax, Kate," Jenny said. "He's more happy to see you than he is angry."

"Are you sure?"

"Very," Jenny said. "I've known LeRoy Jethro Gibbs for a long time." Kate couldn't help but to wonder just how long, and how well, the Director had known her Boss.

Tony and Ziva came around the corner from the service elevator to the parking area. They were bickering over some point of Ziva's driving, when Ziva stopped dead in her tracks.

"What's the matter," Tony asked. "I was only kidding. I don't really think you were trying to kill us both."



When she didn't answer, he turned to see what she was staring, wide-eyed at, and promptly tripped over his own feet, bouncing off the corner of his McGee's desk and falling to the floor at Kate's feet. The look of shock on his face had been even better than McGee's. Kate couldn't quite suppress a laugh.

Tony was back on his feet in a second, staring in disbelief at the woman in the bullpen. "Kate?" he asked, in the quavering voice of a man unsure of his own sanity.

"It's me Tony," she said. She moved closer and wrapped her arms around him. "And as much as I can't even believe I'm saying this, I really missed you."

It was a full two seconds before he could even respond. She was beginning to pull away from him when he grabbed her and hugged her back, so hard she thought he'd crack her ribs. "I can't believe it," he said, repeating the words over and over again.

Finally, he let her go. "How is this possible?" he asked, his eyes glistening with unshed tears. The very sight touched Kate's heart. She'd always known that Tony was softer than he let on, but she hadn't expected a reaction like this. She smiled and began to speak, but was cut off by the Director.

"Not just yet," Agent DiNozzo, the Director said. "Agent Todd," she said, gesturing to Ziva, who'd stepped up next to Tony, "this is…"

"Officer David," Kate finished for her. She held out a hand. "It's a pleasure to finally meet you."

"Likewise," Ziva said, though the tone of her voice, confused, and suspicious at once, left some doubt.

"I must say," Kate said. "The resemblance is remarkable."

"Resemblance?" Ziva asked.

"I've gotten to know your sister quite well the last three years."

Suddenly, everything fell into place in Ziva's mind. It explained so much that she'd been wondering about the last three years, especially lately.

McGee returned from Agent Balboa's bullpen, and said, "Gibbs wants everyone in the conference room when he gets back, so…"

Jenny smiled to herself. She was happy to finally have this monkey off her back, and though Jethro would likely be upset with her for a while, the return of Agent Todd should more than compensate for that. She'd been harboring hope since her appointment as NCIS Director that maybe the two of them could pick up the pieces of their long ago romance, but that idea had come to crashing halt in her office fifteen minutes ago. Jethro Gibbs had his heart set on one woman, and it wasn't Jenny Sheppard.

The team began filing in the direction of the conference room, all of them trying at once to ask Agent Todd a hundred different questions. She took it all pretty well. There were plenty of spectators as well, other agents, even Cynthia, on the upper level, looking down, all getting a glimpse of a dead woman.



As they reached the staircase, a dark missile flew from the hallway, crashing into Kate and knocking her sprawling to the floor. Not a single person there could help but smile.

Kate hadn't even had the time to prepare herself before Abby hit her, like a tidal wave. If possible, the hug she'd wrapped her friend in was even tighter than Tony's. They both crashed to the floor, but neither seemed to care, at least not until Kate remembered that she was wearing a skirt, and Tony would certainly be trying to get a peek at her thighs. When she looked, to her surprise, he wasn't. At least not in an obvious way. The Tony she remembered would have been obvious about it, just to get under her skin.

"Kate, you're really here," Abby said, when they'd finally disentangled themselves and stood.

"I'm here, Abs," Kate said, smiling. She took a step closer and hugged Abby again, this time without the two of them crashing to the floor.

"We were just heading up to the conference room," McGee said to Abby. When Abby made no move to let Kate go, he added, "Where Gibbs said we should be."

"OK," Abby said, but she still didn't let go of her friend. Finally, after another ten seconds had passed, she unwrapped her arms from around Kate and walked with them to the conference room next to M-TAC. Everyone took a seat around the large, glass table, excepting only Ziva, who chose a spot near the doorway where she could stand and see everyone at once., The Director sat at the head of the table, for the time being.

They'd barely managed to get everyone in when Ducky came through the door. "Caitlyn, how wonderful to see you again, my dear." Kate stood and allowed him to embrace her. "You're looking quite well."

"Thank you Ducky," she answered.

With the exception of Ziva, and the Director, the others were all looking to one another in surprise. Ducky didn't seem the least bit surprised about Kate being alive and well. Ziva figured it out first, nodding silently to herself. Of course Ducky would have had to be in on it all from the beginning. He'd supposedly performed Kate Todd's autopsy.

Abby was next. This explained the mysterious meeting Ducky had been headed to earlier, with the Director. Finally, Tony and McGee caught up with Ziva.

A simple command, and it was a command, from the Director prevented them all from deluging Kate with the hundreds of questions they were all dying to have answered. Instead, they chatted about small things, the lighter shade of Kate's hair, the ever-so-slightly different shape to her cheekbones, the Prada bag she had set on the table, as inane as that all might seem. That last question, about the bag, was from the Director.

In all, they passed almost five minutes that way waiting for Gibbs.



CHAPTER SEVEN

Gibbs left the NCIS building and walked off the Navy Yard. Once past the gate, he turned right and headed for the mom and pop coffee shop two blocks up, where he stopped several times a day for coffee. The owners were a former Marine and his wife. They kept a special pot of extra-strong coffee on a burner in the back, just for their best customer.

He opened the door and stepped inside. Jane looked up at him and smiled before returning her attention to the customer at the counter. Henry stepped into the back and poured a cup, returning to the counter. "Morning, Gunny," he said. "Hell of a day isn't it?"

"Yeah," Gibbs said, "it sure is."

"Everything alright, Gunny?"

"Better than alright, Sir," Gibbs said. Henry had been a Lieutenant when he'd opted out after a 20 year hitch. "Best day I've had in years." As was usual for Gibbs, his expression and tone didn't really say much, unless he was trying to make a point Here, he could have been talking about the price of bread.

"You don't seem too happy about it," Henry said.

"Just trying to figure out what my next move should be."

"A woman then," Jane said, stepping over, having finished with her customer. "It has to be a woman."

Gibbs just smiled at her, set three dollar bills on the counter and turned to leave. "Yes, ma'am, he said. It usually is a woman." Jane and Henry both laughed as he stepped back onto the street.

He walked as he thought. He wasn't ready to go back just yet. What was he going to do? He rarely had to think long about a decision. He was usually thinking ahead, and on the rare occasions that he was caught flat-footed, his gut pointed him in the right direction. Well, he'd certainly been caught off guard today. And his gut was no help. His head and his heart were at war for his soul at the moment.

Instead of heading for the Navy Yard, he found himself at D.C. Beans, where he'd surprised Kate the morning of her abduction by Ari four years earlier. He walked through the door and the memories flooded back. He remembered how she'd looked in her jacket and skirt, how beautiful. He'd wanted to kiss her that morning, and pretty much every morning they'd worked together, but he was her Boss. He'd ruthlessly pushed aside any feelings he had for her.

He remembered running off the crop insurance man who'd tried to strike up a conversation with her. He hadn't been rude, or threatening, but the man had gotten the message just the same, as Gibbs had known he would.

He remembered how she'd thought he was there to fire her, or worse, to tell her she was going undercover as DiNozzo's wife. He chuckled at that. Ziva hadn't really minded, other than her complaints about his snoring, which was also funny since she was as bad, or worse.



He sat at the table where they'd talked that morning, and ran his hand over the top. It was clean, freshly wiped. He sipped at his coffee and tried to decide what to do. He wanted Kate back on his team. She was one hell of an agent, smart, intuitive, creative, driven, and her profile training was a major advantage. On the other hand, if she came back to work for him, Rule Twelve would prevent them from being more than colleagues, and right now Gibbs was having a hard time thinking of Kate as a co-worker rather than a beautiful woman.

He got up from the table and moved to the counter. A worker drone, with a nametag that indicated his name was Josh asked him what he'd like. He ordered one of those large boxes of coffee most places have these days, a cardboard box, with an insulated liner. It held enough for a dozen cups. Josh poured the box, and filled a small bag with cups, individual creamer cups, sugar, both real and fake, & stirrers. He added some extra sugar, at Gibbs request, so DiNozzo could make the sickly sweet crap he drank, and added a small container of milk. Gibbs assumed that Kate would still prefer that to cream. Josh placed all of it into a larger, plastic bag, took the money Gibbs proffered, and returned his change.

Gibbs walked back to the Navy Yard, continuing his internal struggle the entire way, Ever since Shannon , he'd been a wreck in his love life. Three bad marriages, and his ill-conceived affair with Jenny. He'd fallen for Kate almost immediately, and though he'd never actually pursued her romantically, her "death" had broken his heart far more than any of his divorces. It was the prime reason he'd never been able to really open up to Holly Mann. She was the kind of woman he could have loved. A lot like Kate, actually, strong, intelligent, resourceful, and she'd loved him, but he hadn't been willing to risk his heart again.

He got on the elevator and rode it to the top, and exited. He walked to the conference room and set the bag upon the table without a word. Jenny got up from the chair at the head of the table and gestured for him to take it.

"I'm sure you all have a lot of questions for Agent Todd," she said. Understatement of the year. As she left the room, she called back over her shoulder, "Remember Jethro, I do not want to find out that you've briefed your team on a Top Secret op that they aren't cleared for." She shut the door firmly behind herself and returned to her office. She couldn't make up her mind whether she envied Agent Todd right now or not.



CHAPTER EIGHT

Kate sat quietly at the table for a moment after the Director left. Gibbs sipped at his coffee. Most of the others poured themselves some from the box he'd brought. He'd even made a last minute stop for Abby's Caf-Pow. While everyone had been surprised and thrilled to see her, most were now looking at her with what seemed to be mixed emotions. Curiosity, giddiness, disbelief, suspicion. They undoubtedly wondered why they hadn't been trusted, why they hadn't been let in on things from the start.

There were two exceptions. Gibbs rarely took his eyes from her, but they were all but unreadable to her. What was he thinking? And Ducky. His expression was warm, supportive. He already knew the secrets. He'd known them all along, and he'd kept them from everyone as well, including Gibbs. She said a small, silent, thanks to God that Ducky was there.

All it took was a single word from Gibbs to quiet down the room. Once he'd established order, he turned back to her, and though he was speaking to the room, his eyes never left her own. "This is off the record. In fact, this whole meeting never took place. None of us will ever discuss what was said in here with anyone, even amongst ourselves, where anyone can possibly overhear. If anyone asks, you do not know what they are talking about. Is that clear?"

The chorus of affirmations from his team was exactly what he'd expected. When silence again held sway in the room, he said, "Start at the beginning, Kate."

She looked once around the room at these people, all of whom she loved so much, as much as her own family, even Tony. The only exception was Ziva, and she looked so much like Tea, whom Kate had come to like very much, that she even felt some sense of friendship toward her.

"It all started on the night you had coffee with Ari. Director Morrow had just gotten off the line with the Director of the FBI. They'd warned him about their discovery of Ari's supposed cover mission for al'Qaeda. He called me up to M-TAC to discuss placing me in charge of your protection detail. A call came in from the Deputy-Director of Mossad." At this Ziva flinched, just the tiniest bit, but most people in the room still noticed.

Kate went on, "The Director asked me to step outside, but the tech on duty informed him that Deputy-Director David had also asked for me, by name. I stayed. A high-ranking CIA officer, whose name I am not allowed to divulge to you, was conferenced in. They explained what they'd figured out, regarding Ari's plans. They didn't know his target for the cruise missile, but they trusted we would stop it. Director David had also reasoned out many things about Ari's hatred of Gibbs. He predicted that Ari would try to kill me, and suggested we allow him to think he'd succeeded."

"Why?" Tony asked.

"Questions later, DiNozzo," Gibbs said. "For now, we let her tell her story." The younger agent, just nodded his assent. Under the table, his hand found Ziva's, who'd taken a seat next to him, and squeezed hard. She didn't flinch from that.

Kate continued. "They told me they had a plan to roll up the organization of one of the world's most ruthless and notorious arms dealers and drug runners, Gregor Mikhailovich Uriadin." She'd been calm, and steady throughout her recitation, to that point, but she almost spat out the name."



"The Vulture," Tony said, and quickly added, "Sorry Boss, shutting up now."

"I'm impressed Tony," Kate said. "He's not as well known here as in Europse and Asia."

"He was one of La Grenouille's competitor's," he answered.

"The Frenhcman?" Kate asked. "What does he have to do with anything?"

The look of frustration on Gibbs face was enough to prompt Tony. "A story for another time," he said. "Why don't you go on."

Kate nodded to herself. That was indeed a story she wanted to hear, she thought.

Gibbs took another sip of his coffee and the look he gave her practically shouted, "We're waiting!"

"I agreed, though both Director Morrow and I fought to keep the team in the loop. Both Mossad and CIA refused. They would rather have dropped the operation altogether. Apparently, until last week, only three people at Mossad even knew of the operation's existence, and only four at CIA, plus the SecDef. She told them about the FBI sniper who shot her with the gel capsule. She'd never actually met him, but she'd been amused that he'd shared his name, and so far as she understood things, a lineage with a famous Washington assassin from more than a century earlier."

She went on to describe the elaborate measures taken to fake her death. She and Ducky took turns answering multiple questions, Gibbs had shown some patience there. He'd expected the rash of questions at that juncture and he'd been prepared for it. He'd had a number himself earlier.

Kate moved on, describing the year she'd spent in Israel, studying Russian, learning every little detail she possibly could about Nadia Valenkova, so that she could take her place. She told them about the long hours she spent training in espionage and hand-to-hand combat with Ziva's sister.

She stopped talking long enough to open her purse and remove a small bottle of extra-strength Tylenol. She took two and washed them down with coffee. The gel cartridge and the metal plate may have protected her from truly serious injury, but ever since that night, she got regular, and very painful headaches.

She continued on, explaining how Mossad had arranged a means to place her in a place where Uriadin could not fail to notice her, and he hadn't. They'd opened a florist shop in Rome, in her name. The real Nadia Valenkova had been a student of Horticulture at Moscow University when Gregor had first met her, and she'd always dreamed of living in Italy. When he was there for a meeting, they arranged for her to be having lunch at the same café where he would meet his Italian distributor. It wasn't long before he was showering her with gifts, and pursuing her relentlessly. What the Vulture wanted, he got. She left out many details, shuddering even to think to herself of the times he'd touched her. By the way her teammates either looked away, or at her with sympathy, or by the way Gibbs' jaw was clenched, they knew damned well what she wasn't telling them. Only Ziva seemed accepting of it all, and that didn't surprise Kate. Tea had been amused by her reluctance.

She talked for almost an hour. She left out many details, but she gave them all the broad strokes, right up to the afternoon that Uriadin and his cohorts had been taken down in London. To the best of her knowledge, they were all now in Tel-Aviv, being questioned by the Mossad. That was certainly something she didn't envy them.



She spent another half-hour answering questions, occasionally with some help from Ducky.

Throughout the whole thing, Gibbs barely spoke three sentences. He'd sat and listened, and sipped his coffe, and watched her with those damned unreadable, and beautiful, blue eyes of his. She knew she probably shouldn't even think of him that way, but she couldn't help it.

Finally, she worked up the nerve to ask the question that had been on her mind for three years. "I know it's been a long time, but is there room for me to come back?"

Almost as one, everyone turned to Gibbs. Five agents would be more than the MCRT team had ever had, unless you counted the day Gibbs came back to work after his "margarita safari", as the Director referred to it, and until Agent Lee transferred to Legal.

Gibbs looked at the, now empty, coffee cup in his hand, and then looked around the room to each of his team, his eyes meeting theirs. This was a question he'd been asking himself as well. Finally, he his gaze returned to Kate, his blue eyes locking once more with her beautiful brown eyes. "Your old desk is Ziva's now. You'll have to take the one on the end."

A cheer went up from almost everyone in the room. Kate was mobbed by her friends, all hugging her and welcoming her back. Only Ziva, who was still uncomfortable with such displays, and Gibbs, who sat in his chair, never taking his eyes from Kate's face, refrained.



CHAPTER NINE

Not surprisingly, it was Tony who broke the awkward silence after Kate had finished her story, and again not surprisingly, his comment revolved around food. "I could sure use a slice of pepperoni and mushroom right now."

No one said a word. Gibbs still held Kate's gaze with his own. "Go on," he finally said. "All of you, go home. We're done for the day."

McGee glanced at his watch. It was only a little after three. He'd never known Gibbs to send them all home early. Of course, they'd never had a co-worker come back from the dead, either.

"Are you sure…" Ziva started to ask, at the same time that Tony said, "Thanks, Boss."

"Go on," Gibbs said, waving his hand in a shooing gesture, "before I change my mind."

"Who's up for Chinese?" Tony asked as he stood and slipped into his suit jacket.

"Weren't you just talking about pizza?" Abby asked, even as she closed on Kate and wrapped her in another massive hug.

"What," Tony said, "a guy can't change his mind?"

"You'd have to have one to change first, Tony," McGee threw in.

"Watch it, Probie," Tony answered, in mock indignation.

Kate couldn't help but smile. She'd missed this. Juvenile and often unprofessional as it was, she'd really missed all of it.

As a group, they began heading for the door, until Tony noticed that Gibbs was still sitting, watching them. "You coming, Boss?" A simple shake of the head was all the answer he got. "Want me to bring some soup back for you?"

"Just go, DiNozzo," Gibbs said, "before I find something for you to do around here, like re-writing that slop you called a report on the Ferguson case."

"See ya, Boss," Tony said, dashing out the door.

Just before it closed, Gibbs called out, "Keep your cell phones on, just in case."

Kate watched Gibbs from outside as the door slowly closed, before moving to join her friends at the elevator. She wished that she had some glimmer of an idea about what was going on behind his beautiful blue eyes.

For his part, Gibbs watched the door slowly close, and seal him off from the woman he wanted more than life itself. He could have gone with them, but what he really wanted, really needed, was to talk to Kate alone. And 

he knew himself well enough to know exactly how frustrated he'd have been sitting at the table, listening to DiNozzo and McGee's inane chatter, Abby's unending questions, and Ducky's seemingly endless stories. By the time they'd finished eating, he'd likely have chewed a hole in his napkin.

He sat another moment, to allow them time to leave the building before standing. Part of him wanted to walk over to the coffee shop and get another cup, but he didn't want to chance running into his team in the parking lot. It could wait. He left the conference room and headed back to the bullpen. There was some paperwork he could catch up on. It would keep him occupied until it was time to go, and he'd get more done than normal, not having to referee some idiotic dispute between his underlings.

As he came around the corner, he realized that he should have listened to his instincts, and gone for coffee. The Director was sitting in his chair, her high heels resting on the corner of his desk.

She smirked, but got up and moved when he again made the shooing gesture. He slipped past her, and sat down, not even noticing for once the sweet and heady scent of her perfume. The fact was not lost on Jenny Sheppard. She moved across the way to Tony's desk and seated herself on the edge, facing Jethro, purposely sliding back a bit to flash a bit more of her legs. Gibbs barely noticed, if he noticed at all. Wow. She'd suspected there was something here, but she hadn't realized just how far gone he was.

"So, Jethro," she said, "what are we going to do about Agent Todd?"

"I'll have maintenance move out that old desk on the end next to McGee's," he said without looking up. "They can bring in a new one, and she can sit there."

"That wasn't exactly what I meant," Jenny said in a somewhat amused tone, "though it does answer at least one question." Gibbs stopped shuffling papers around his desk and looked up at her, with that irritated look, the one he was so good at, which sent probies everywhere, and more than a few experienced agents running for cover. Jenny didn't flinch. "I meant, will the two of you be able to work together effectively despite your feelings for one another?"

"What the hell are you talking about Jen?" Gibbs asked in a rough voice.

"You may be able to throw the others off," she answered, "but nobody here knows you as well as I do. Not even Ducky."

"You think there is something going on between me and Kate?"

"Of course not. She's been dead for three years, at least as far as you knew." Gibbs waited, continuing with the hard stare. Jen continued, "But I knew the first night I took this job, and I can see it now. You love her Jethro, whether you'll admit it, even to yourself, or not."

Gibbs re-focused on the work at his desk, more than enough confirmation for Jenny that she'd hit the target. She said, "I'm betting that she doesn't know."

"No," Gibbs said.

"No, she doesn't know, or no, you're not in love with her?"



"She doesn't know." He stopped his paper shuffling again and looked up at her, and Jenny saw something she'd rarely, if ever seen in him, indecision.

"You should tell her Jethro," she said. "And don't quote Rule number Twelve to me."

"I'm her Boss, Jen."

"I can fix that any time you want," Jen said. "Truth be told, from what I've read and heard about Agent Todd, and from what I know about you, I'd have confidence that the two of you could handle it, regardless." She stood and started to walk toward the stairs, back to her office. Gibbs was staring straight ahead, as if lost in thought.

As she reached the turn in the stairs, she looked back down at him. He still seemed frozen in place. "Jethro," she said, waiting until he shook off his reverie and looked up at her. "Tell her, Jethro." He seemed unconvinced. As she turned again and started back up the stairs, she said, "She loves you too."

For a brief second, Gibbs was stunned. By the time Jen reached the top of the stairs, his shock was gone. It was replaced by a smug and cocky grin. He went back to his paperwork, for now.



CHAPTER TEN

It would take time, but things would return to normal around the office. Kate was sure of that now, especially after having shared a meal and a few hours of conversation and camaraderie with her teammates. They'd ordered half a dozen entrees and several appetizers from Fong Chow's, and split them up. It was reassuring, in an odd way, to know that Tony was still perfectly happy to sneak a shrimp or a bit of scallop off her plate when he thought she wasn't looking, and that McGee would still offer the last bit of lo mein around to everyone else before finishing it off.

After the Chinese food, they'd gone back to Abby's place and spent several more hours talking. She was forced to tell them all about Europe, and about the places she'd been. She talked a little bit to Ziva about Tea, and how close they'd become. She was left with the impression that she was going to like the other woman. Tony certainly was smitten with her. There was a tiny tug of jealousy there, but it was nothing really. She was alternately fascinated, and near tears with laughter, hearing about McGee's new writing career.

She listened attentively while they told her about a number of bizarre cases they'd worked. The Humvee that drove itself, the terrorist who'd stolen the BZ gas, the Halloween abduction of a little girl. She tried very hard not to show too much emotion when McGee started talking about Gibbs and this Lt. Colonel Mann. Kate's heart felt like it might break. She was only somewhat relieved when they told her that the woman had moved to Hawaii.

She told them, as much as she could bear to, about Uriadin, and her time with him, which brought her to tears more than once.

The highlight of the evening came when Ziva, over Tony's strenuous objections, told them all about the first meeting between the two of them, which led, of course, to Kate throwing a pillow at Tony from across the room while comparing him, rather unfavorably, to any member of the porcine family.

Eventually, her friends had to begin drifting away. Ducky was first, claiming the need to make dinner for his mother. Kate almost laughed as she was flooded with memories of her time with Mrs. Mallard, and her pack of beloved Corgis, even Tyson, the biter. She was certainly a character. McGee was next. He was due to have dinner with his family at Antonio's, his favorite steak house. Tony & Ziva made their exit a short time later. Ziva mentioned something about a promised conversation, which seemed to make Tony more than a little nervous.

Only Kate and Abby remained. They hugged again and reminisced, about their own early meetings, and Kate's tattoo, and any number of other things. Abby told Kate about the dream she'd had the night before, which brought on another round of hugs, which was certainly not unusual for Abs, after all. Eventually, Kate excused herself, promising to call Abby the next day. She stepped outside and walked to the corner. It was full on dark, closing in on eight o'clock. She hailed a cab and asked the driver to take her to her hotel.

Agent Lee had gone ahead with her bags and checked her in. The key had been left at the front desk, in an envelope with her name. The bags were laid out neatly on the end of the bed.

Kate took a few minutes to unpack, settling her things into the various drawers and the closet as much as she could. This room would be home, after all, until she found a new place to live. She set out all her makeup and bath products in the bathroom. She took a few seconds to glance at her reflection in the mirror.



She barely even noticed anymore that her hair was lighter, by three or four shades, than it had been before she took the assignment in Europe, or that her cheekbones had been lifted by a tiny bit. She looked enough like her old self that her friends either hadn't noticed the changes, or had ignored them.

She also noticed that she looked tired. Not something she wanted tonight. She'd made her decision in the cab on the ride over. She'd find out the lay of the land tonight, one way or another. Three years was more than long enough to wait.

She opened a small bottle of aspirin and took a pair, washing them down with a gulp of water from the sink, setting aside the glass when she was done. She quickly undressed and stepped into the shower, before turning it on. A blast of icy water certainly helped to revive her, and it gradually warmed until it was hot enough to throw off a good amount of steam. She took her time, thoroughly washing and rinsing her hair, lathering her body with herbal soap and rinsing away the day's grit, twice. She carefully shaved her legs and underarms. Finally, feeling very refreshed and ready to go, she stepped out and toweled herself dry.

She was careful, taking her time making up her face, drying and styling her hair. She didn't use much makeup. She didn't need much. Her hair she left straight, adding just a few gentle waves. She moved back to the bedroom and searched through her things. She chose a pair of black lace panties and a matching bra. After trying several options, she finally settled on a long, charcoal grey, pleated skirt, with a black silk blouse and black sandals. No stockings. For jewelry she chose only a pair of small pearl earrings and her silver Bulova watch. A tiny spritz of rose scented perfume and she was ready to go. The last thing she took was her personal .380 Sig Sauer, from under the pillow on the bed, where she'd put it earlier, placing it into her shoulder bag before taking her key and heading out.

Twenty minutes later, she stepped from another cab, handing the driver two ten dollar bills. "Keep the change."

The neighborhood was quiet, and fairly dark. The streetlight just down from the house was burned out. The only light coming from the house shone through the basement window. Kate just smiled to herself. Typical.

She'd only ever been to her Boss's house once before, but she remembered every detail.

She started out by trying the doorbell, but as she'd expected, he'd never gotten around to fixing it. He probably didn't want to. The door was unlocked, so she let herself in, quietly shutting the door behind her. She moved through the front room easily, sliding between the furnishings. There was enough moonlight coming in through the windows on the side of the house to light the way well enough. There was also a little bit of light coming through the little breakfast nook between the living room and kitchen. In addition to the light, a wonderful aroma wafted from the kitchen, tomato and oregano, other spices. It was enough to make Kate's stomach growl a bit. She'd last had a bite to eat around three-thirty.

The house was almost preternaturally quiet. She moved down the hall toward the bathroom and the bedrooms. She wasn't trying to be overly quiet. It was part of her natural instinct now to move carefully and quietly. Another leftover from her sessions with Tea.

She reached the door to the basement. A sliver of light escaped from underneath. She could just make out the sound of soft music. Unless she was mistaken, it was Chopin's Allegro Con Fuoco Nocturne No. 15. She smiled. It was one of her own favorites, though she wouldn't have pictured her Boss as a classical kind of guy. If anything, she'd have guessed maybe golden oldies, Buddy Holly, Sam Cooke, even The King.

She took a deep breath and opened the door. The music was clearer, louder, but still not overly loud. There was the unmistakable smell of sawdust, and now Kate could hear the rhythmic sound of sandpaper sliding across wood, shush, shush, shush.

There was Gibbs, wearing a pair of faded blue jeans and a black t-shirt with the Marine Corps symbol on the front and the Corps' motto, Semper Fidelis. He had a piece of fine sandpaper wrapped around a small wooden block, and was using it to sand one of the ribs that formed the spine of his latest boat. Without looking up from what he was doing, he said, "Come on in, Kate."

She'd have been surprised, but he'd always seemed to have nearly unbelievable senses, seeing what it should have been impossible for him to see, and hearing what it should have been impossible for him to hear.

"Gibbs," she said, by way of greeting. She started down the steps.

"Stop," he said. She was about halfway down, but she stopped. He looked up and saw her. Her heart began to beat faster as his blue eyes looked her up and down, which was only fair, since his heart sped up as well. She looked incredible, as he'd known she would, but still he had trouble breathing, as though something heavy were pressing down on his chest. He'd likely have feared he was having a heart attack if he hadn't experienced the same earlier in the day.

Kate watched him looking at her. There was something in his eyes, a hunger, an electrical charge which spoke volumes on the vast undercurrents of emotion running between them. After a moment, he set aside the sandpaper and wooden block, and waved her down. She continued down the steps. He turned the radio down a bit.

Kate hesitated at the bottom of the stairs. Gibbs turned to face her. She wanted her legs to move. She wanted to step toward him, but she couldn't. He took away the need. He walked to her, until he was standing almost on top of her. She craned her neck to look up into his eyes.

"Katie," he said, raising a hand, touching her cheek gently with the backs of his fingers.

Her lips parted slightly, and she let out a long breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding. She raised her own hand, touching his face, letting her fingertips trace the line of his jaw. His skin was smooth. He'd taken the time to shave after work.

Gibbs turned his hand around, cupping her face with his hand. Her skin was so soft and warm. He let his thumb slide down over her lips. "Gibbs…" she started to say, rather breathlessly, but he cut her off by leaning down over her and pressing his lips hard to hers. His right arm snaked around her, pulling her body into him as his mouth sought hers again.

For her part, Kate melted into the man. She'd dreamed of this moment so many times in the five years since she'd first met Gibbs. She'd played it out in her mind so many times. The first time had been on Air Force One. Even then, she'd recognized the attraction between them. She kissed him back, fiercely, soft moans escaping her lips. He pulled her to him, and she went willingly. His tongue found hers. After what seemed like forever, he pulled back from the kiss. She could barely breathe, and she collapsed against his chest.



"God, Gibbs…" she whispered. She doubted she could have spoken in a level voice if she'd tried. And her knees felt weak. He took her hand and walked up the steps without another word. She followed him, weak knees and all. The fear she'd felt on the way over, the trepidation, it was all gone. She wanted this man. She'd wanted him for a long time, and he clearly felt the same. Five years of harnessed emotion, of unspoken feeling, of pent up passion, for the both of them would be unleashed. Kate had never wanted anything this much in her entire life.



CHAPTER ELEVEN